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As the story goes, Luke Skywalker's Uncle Owen is shopping for some new droids at the Jawa Sandcrawler. There are plenty to choose from, including R2-D2 and C-3PO. But the Jawas drive a hard bargain and danger is never far away. With Lego mini-figures of all the characters -- even the minor ones -- it's fun to re-enact this classic scene from "Episode IV: A New Hope." The set includes 11 mini-figures: Uncle Owen Lars, three Jawas, R2-D2, C-3PO, R5-D4, R1-G4, ASP droid, gonk droid, and Treadwell droid.

Action-Packed

Recommended for ages 12 years and up, the Sandcrawler incorporates 1,669 elements. The center section of the model removes to reveal the Jawa workshop. A crane loads droids into the Sandcrawler. The cockpit opens to load a driver and steering mechanism with moving treads, which will guide the Jawa vehicle to its next adventure. Developed in co-operation between consumer requests, fans, and Lego designers, this Star Wars model measures 15 inches long, 7.5 inches wide, and 9 inches high.

Wanna see some pictures? Let's start with the normal box arts and manuals! All pictures that can be clicked on, will go to a full size photo.

Box front

Box rear

Side of box

Other side of box

Parts bags 1 of 2 pictures

Parts bags 2 of 2 pictures

Instruction book

Back of instruction book

Here you can see the crane on the roof. It's modular so it stores in the front part of the Sandcrawler.

Robot lineup (front)

Robot lineup(rear)

Rest of the minifigs

It was at this point where Uncle Ben realized that the rug mats he was given weren't mats.

Here is another photo-build. I hope you like it.

Here i where you can see the floorboard finished. Those beige pieces are what holds the black pieces together. I think they should've made them black to match the floor. And as you will find out, they are not strong enough to hold the floorboard together.

Next you can see one of the rear walls put up with the opposite side wall completed and added to the Sandcrawler.

This is the rear of the Sandcrawler being made. That's pretty much the finished wall on the right panel. It's very detailed. No smooth walls here.

Next you can see the completed interior. The left side don't have the support beams overhead yet, but gives you the layout of the inside. As you can see, it's very plain. The light grey 1x12 bars are used later as a guide for the platform of the crane.

In the 8 panels above you can get a closeup view of the treads and how they fit on the tracks. In the above left photo, I tried to put each of the tracks in a partial build. If you looks carefully on the picture on the right, you can see how Lego took some shortcuts. The brown part of the track that show only on th outside is only on the outside. I guess they figured if you can't see the inside of the tracks, then that's less pieces needed.

Here you can see the completed workshop. There in the middle is some sort of master control, around the sides are different tools that the Jawas can use. Funny how even in a galaxy far, far away, they use an oil can just like us.

Here you can see the completed crane platform and the normal workshop cover for the roof of the workshop. Again, very detailed with lots of pipes, rods and gratings.

Finished build

This is the cockpit. This alone you can tell that the Sandcrawler isn't built to size. The little lone Jawa sits (stands) in his seat. They gave him to joystick controllers and a cockpit with a view. Although it's a fake view.

Top view with everything closed. Very nice detail on the Sandcrawler. Many shades of brown with odds and ends of studs and wires on the surface.

Top view with the two top panels removed. One is for the center box and the other is a small loading hole for when you have the crane set up above the big hole.

Removed the center workshop. Here, you can have fun playing with all your little robots and Jawas. By removing this center piece, it will allow access to the inside of the crawler. Which is not much for play space.

Another view of the workshop box area removed. Covers to the side.

Closeup of the removable workshop with all the characters standing in it.

Front open. Here you can see the crane platform. It can slide out and be used on the ground, or you can place it on the top of the Sandcrawler.

Top view of the same box with everybody in it.

Final photo with the front open and all the droids standing in front of the Sandcrawler. Uncle Ben trying to get a good deal, while C-3PO is trying to get R2-D2 off the crane. I still have no idea why there are doors on the Sandcrawler with no doors. Very trusting these Jawas.

OMG! They blew it up!

I was warned that the base of the Sandcrawler is not very well built. They used single rows of studs to join the floorboards to each other. I thought it was well enough built being that the walls were up. Oh I was wrong. When I picked up the Sandcrawler by the two arches inside the Sandcrawler, the crawler cracked in half. And that is what you see in the pictures above. Needless to say, everybody who was around me was looking at me. It wasn't too hard to put back. Maybe another 10 minutes of time. Most of the parts was still together in clumps. As a side benefit, I did find one piece I was missing and I could add it to the build.

Features

This set has many features. This is a set that can be considered a UCS made for playing. It has a middle section that is removable so you can play in the Sandcrawler and in the removable workshop. The front opens like the movie, there is a working crane to lift up the droids the Jawas steal, I mean find in the sand. The crane stand can also be placed on the top of the workshop to lift the droids up to the top of the Sandcrawler and dropped into the loading hole. There's a total of 5 droids to play with plus R2-D2, C-3PO, Uncle Ben, and 3 Jawas. I wish they included Luke. The tracks on the Sandcrawler can move using a rotation knob on the back of the Sandcrawler.

Not to many "rare" parts. Uncle Ben and Jawas are the only minifigs I can think of that you can't get elsewhere. <Whap!> Ouch! I was reminded that this whole thing is rare parts bin. Anybody looking for any brown parts will have a fun time. From the half-drums (brown) to all the "L" and 2x2 brown colored pieces. Pretty much if you want brown, this is THE set to get.

My rating:

Playability: 4 out of 5. Everything about this is for playing. The only reason why I didn't give it a 5 out of 5 is that it WILL BREAK EASILY! There's only a single row of studs holding some of the floor plates in the Sandcrawler.

Design: 3 out of 5. I'm being picky about this. The unit isn't to any scale. The inside of the Sandcrawler is nothing like the movie. There was no crane. Where's the suction tube that sucked R2 into the Sandcrawler? Why are there doors on the side with no doors?? I guess if they tried to make it to scale, the whole unit would be another 50% larger. Which would make it way too expensive.

Build experience: 4 out of 5. It's not hard to build. But it is fragile when putting it together. It's like trying to build a house out of Lego. All the sides are mostly single stud wide for the walls. I'm sure a few choice blaster shots from a imperial canon could put holes into this Sandcrawler.

Overall: 4 out of 5. Get it on sale. I paid around the $135 for it. Considering 1600+ pieces for a Star Wars set, it's a good value.

Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed it!

All smaller photos are click able for larger picture sizes! You can see all photos used here: 10144 Sandcrawler

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I wanted to comment this earlier, now this is the right chance for me to write it out.

This is another in depth photo arena arrangement layout which you have done. Your crisp clear pictures and the in depth building process has speaked for itself, of the majestic grand size of this crawler. Basically, I quite fond of this set, but find it rather costly. Surprisely, the brown parts are the main use of it if I can ever afford this set. Those droids are nice but not essential. On the other hand, those Jawas and Uncle Owen are great minifigs. I agreed with you, that they should include Luke in this set.

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I never had any issues with mine, and it was moved on at least one occasion by an... uncareful person.

I have to say, reading your review makes me want to dig mine out of storage and build it again, I always loved this set. So big, yet playable. I'm going to have to hold off, though, or I won't have room for the upcoming stuff.

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This set will always be special to me. It's the second set I purchased. The first being the latest version of th MTT. That's a lot of brown pieces for my first 2 sets. I love the minifig selection. It's only a shame there is no Luke, cause he was in the scene. The doors on the side are not exactly movie acurate and not really needed. I fixed the floor with some extra pieces and it never fell apart when I re-aranged my collection. I have it displayed with 2 Imperial Landingcrafts and 2 Tusken Raiders. I hope we will get Beru in a future Moist Farm set.

In any way a very nice review.

Edited July 27, 2009 by the horrorist

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I really want to like this set, I'd love to have some Jawas. But every time I look at it I can't help but think the randomly placed orangy and yellowy bits make it look awful. It could have been so muh better if it had been all brown and had lots of extra greebling on the side to make it look much less flat faced. Trouble is it's also just a little too expensive to buy soley to see if it can be improved upon or to use as a parts box....

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I bought and build this set just three weeks ago and think it's a great set. Although it's too fragile to just pick up without a thought, I think they did a great job making it accurate. The set contained a C-3PO with light-yellow hands instead of gold-coloured hands and that just looks like a minifigure is wearing a C-3PO costume. But no problem there; TLC customer service sent me the right one after emailing them.

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I really want this set but I have to save up for this the home one and Tantive IV . I really like the minifig selection from this set. I Haven't got a C3PO yet but will with the Tantive IV and the Jawas look incredible and hope they come out in future sets. The sandcrawler looks cool as with the different coloured bricks lego used to create the outside. Detailing on the whole thing is incredible and I think this is a great lego star wars set.